Communicating Your Research GradResearchLive! 3MT Prep Workshop

Sponsored by The Graduate School 

Communicating research succinctly and engagingly, especially to general audiences, is a critical but rare skill that can give you a boost in the competitive job market inside and outside academia. An effective way to develop this skill is participation in the Three-Minute Thesis, or 3MT, which is very different than other academic exercises in research distillation, such as pitches and lightening talks. Developed in 2008 by the University of Queensland in Australia and now practiced at universities around the globe, the 3MT challenges researchers to tell an appealing story to a non-specialist audience in three minutes or less.  Accompanying the narration is a single static graphic to enhance the audience’s understanding. 

"The hardest part was distilling complex research into language anyone could understand while still capturing its significance. Finding the balance between simplicity and accuracy in such a short time frame was challenging but incredibly rewarding." - 2024 Winner Pegah Safavi, Ph.D. Candidate & Lighthouse Beacon Foundation Graduate Fellow